ing in needed vacation, to supervising the erection of the 

 new Laboratory for the experiment stations, in addition 

 to all the rest — and this vvlien past the age of seventy. 

 Change of occupation, he often said, was sufficient rest. 

 He did not hesitate to assume responsibility when his 

 public work required it. 



To illustrate Doctor Cook's devotion to the public 

 welfare, to the sacrifice of his own pecuniary gain, it 

 should be mentioned that, when as State Geologist he 

 was discovering the valuable clays underlying much of 

 Middlesex County as well as other parts of the State, it 

 was proposed that he should drop the survey, and form a 

 partnership with gentlemen of great wealth, to mine and 

 sell the clays ; he declined the offer, which must have led 

 to fortune, preferring that the knowledge should be pub- 

 lic property. 



Again, when the State Agricultural Experiment Station 

 was established in 1880, in order that the work should not 

 be hampered by even a suspicion of self-seeking (although 

 he was the only man thought of for director, or who could 

 successfully organize it), he insisted that a sum equal to 

 his salary as such director should be deducted from his 

 salary as State Geologist, and then proceeded cheerfully 

 to do work double in intensity if not in time. 



Doctor Cook considered it fundamental, that under- 

 takings should be finished, and constantly warned his 

 pupils and friends against the habit of going from one 

 thing to another, leaving work incomplete. He often in 

 the last years expressed his uneasiness lest he should not 

 be permitted to finish his own works, which from their 

 nature extended over years. It is a source of satisfaction 

 to his fpiends, and of the greatest importance to the State, 

 that he did live to see his work substantially completed. 

 His labors and attainments extended his fame not only 

 throughout the United States, but among the scientific 



